You Never Know about the People Next Door...

Four years ago, Nathan Gasch, an 84 year-old Polish immigrant, moved into the Leisure World retirement community in Mesa, Arizona. Martin Hartmann, an 88 year-old Romanian immigrant, moved into Leisure World and by coincidence, right next door to Mr. Gasch.

Shortly after moving in, Hartmann invited Mr. Gasch over for drinks. Mr. Gasch walks in to find an old photograph of Hartmann on the wall...a young Hartmann...in an SS uniform...at a concentration camp. This might also be an opportune time to mention that Mr. Gasch survived Auschwitz and still has the numbers on his arm to prove it.

Depending on whether you believed the Daily Mail story linked above or this AP article, Hartmann may have been an SS officer at the very same camp where Mr. Gasch was imprisoned and tortured and\or served as a member of the SS Death's Head Guard Battalion at Sachsenhausen (another concentration camp). Either way, Mr. Gasch quietly left his neighbor's home, his mood having...I dunno...suddenly not been so good.

But here's the odd part: Mr. Gasch did not report Hartmann. For four years, Hartmann and Gasch peacefully coexisted, helping each other out with their gardens, chatting in German, and just being good neighbors. Only on August 31 of this year did Hartmann return to Germany to stand trial, having voluntarily reached an agreement with the Department of Justice. Check out the Arizona Republic's profile here.